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GORDON, Wis. — There are close to 60 sets of deer antlers in the Finstad family deer camp south of town, more than one for every year there’s been a camp on the shores of Harriet Lake. A few sets are loose on the coffee table. Most are screwed to plaques. A dozen are full head or shoulder mounts. There isn’t much open wall space remaining, what with a couple bear heads and stuffed bass to boot. But, somehow, they will make room for more antlers, you can be sure of that.

GORDON, Wis. — There are close to 60 sets of deer antlers in the Finstad family deer camp south of town, more than one for every year there’s been a camp on the shores of Harriet Lake. A few sets are loose on the coffee table. Most are screwed to plaques. A dozen are full head or shoulder mounts. There isn’t much open wall space remaining, what with a couple bear heads and stuffed bass to boot. But, somehow, they will make room for more antlers, you can be sure of that.

Wolf supporters on Wednesday, Nov. 14, made good on a September pledge and filed suit to force the federal government to develop a broader recovery plan for gray wolves across more of the U.S. The Center for Biological Diversity filed suit in federal district court in Washington against the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service for violating the Endangered Species Act by never developing a comprehensive recovery plan for gray wolves nationwide.

ISLE ROYALE, Mich. - One of four wolves captured in Minnesota and relocated to Isle Royale in Lake Superior has died, and National Park Service scientists say they don't know why. The wolf was one of four trapped on the Grand Portage Indian Reservation in late September and early October and moved to Isle Royale to help bolster the island's fading wolf population. Wolves are very territorial and will often kill other wolves from outside their pack, but that apparently did not happen in this case.

NORTH STAR TOWNSHIP, Minn. — Tradition is a huge part of the Minnesota deer hunting experience. Stories of big deer bagged and of missed bucks with giant racks that somehow get bigger every year. Ritual night-before-season meals. Who gets to use grandpa's gun and sit in his stand. But there’s a tradition going on at the McCabe family deer camp, in the woods just north of Duluth, that’s extraordinary in its longevity and which shows little sign of fading.

LUTSEN, Minn. -- A nasty, cold-water algae nicknamed “rock snot” has been confirmed in the Poplar River near Lutsen along the North Shore of Lake Superior, the first such finding in a Minnesota trout stream. The freshwater algae, officially called didymo, lives in low-nutrient, low-temperature environments that are common in North Shore streams and Lake Superior, the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources reported Thursday, Oct. 25.

CHIPPEWA NATIONAL FOREST — Jens Heig first checked the tail and rump feathers of the smallish grouse, then checked the edges of the wing feathers. It was a juvenile bird, he concluded, a female. Then he dug into the crop, just to see what the bird had been feeding on (wild strawberry leaves) before digging into his backpack for a field test kit that looks a bit like something from CSI Northwoods.

SOUTH OF BALL CLUB, Minn. — In the woods of the Chippewa National Forest, with the late morning sun shining through mostly leafless trees, a beam of light enveloped an English setter named Tyler that was frozen on point. Ken Taylor, Tyler's owner, was handling the dog. Jeff "Cubby" Skelly, a local hunting guide, was moving forward on the left, ready to shoot, as was hunter Jim DePolo on the right. Jens Heig, another local guide, was watching closely, as was this newspaper reporter.

1902 - The U.S. General Land Office sets aside 500,000 acres in what would become the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness, keeping it undeveloped by removing it from settlement acreage being offered to homesteaders. 1904 - Congress grants 20,000 acres to the state for the Burntside Forest Reserve. Minnesota forestry officials declare "State Forest Reserves should be devoted not alone to the business of raising timber, but to the pleasure of all the people."

DULUTH — It passed the U.S. Senate in the last minutes of the last day of a Congressional session that may have been its last chance to pass. Democrats were in power in Minnesota and in Washington, and several Minnesotans were in President Jimmy Carter's administration when the Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness Act passed Congress on Oct. 15, 1978. That included Vice President Walter Mondale and Secretary of Agriculture Bob Bergland, whose department oversaw the U.S. Forest Service that managed what was then the BWCA.